T Rivers is a pseudonymous journalist who covers East and Central Africa.
Here are questions we need to ask right away: If foundational economic principles must be abandoned when things get tough, does capitalism really serve our needs? If rapid, radical change is possible when circumstances demand it, what excuse is there for failing to act with similar urgency to prevent cataclysmic climate change?
The pharmaceutical giant Gilead tried to pull a fast one by seeking a special status that would restrict the supply of its coronavirus drug and boost profits. Luckily, healthcare advocates, left-wing journalists, and Bernie Sanders were having none of it.
For decades, America’s “flexible” labor markets have been celebrated by economists and favorably compared to Europe’s “sclerotic” labor institutions — the products of a century of militant worker struggle. Now, thanks to that very flexibility, the US stands on the brink of an economic disaster.
Faced with the coronavirus shutdown, more people are getting meals delivered straight to their homes. At a time of mass panic buying, the state should step in to guarantee a smooth food supply — and start by turning platforms like Uber Eats and Grubhub into a public service.
The Spanish flu of 1918 infected a quarter of the world population and was decisive to the rise of public health-care systems. Today’s COVID-19 crisis is again showing that collective problems demand collective solutions — and a state that provides for all our essential needs.
Jair Bolsonaro is still refusing to implement basic isolation measures to protect Brazilians against the onslaught of COVID-19, hurtling the country toward disaster. Now his negligence is feeding widespread dissent, and even his former allies are calling for the far-right leader’s removal.
After a decade-long, worldwide corporate debt binge, the bill has come due: huge swaths of the corporate world are now at risk of default, with only governments able to save them. This time, any bailouts must place corporate investment under public control.
US sanctions are devastating in ordinary times. But with the COVID-19 pandemic raging, they’re killing more people than ever.
From failing to develop a vaccine, to evicting the jobless and cutting off their health care, to needlessly subjecting workers and the public to infection: capitalism will be responsible for millions of coronavirus-related deaths.
Britney Spears called for a general strike and wealth redistribution in response to the coronavirus pandemic. Therefore we are legally obliged to publish something about it.
New York governor Andrew Cuomo has issued an executive order requiring all nonessential workers to stay home. But construction workers are still being forced to build luxury condos — more evidence that for capital, high-priced real estate is more important than workers’ lives.
Crises like the one we’re in upend the social order, reveal long-festering conflicts, and throw open the doors to futures both bleak and transformative. We can emerge from this crisis a more just society.
For decades, America’s hospitals have been underfunded and understaffed in the name of efficiency. An examination of conditions at one public hospital in Oakland show us how unprepared this austerity-starved health care system is for what’s to come.
A single-payer system in the United States would have meant a more coordinated public health response to coronavirus crises and free and universal health care to all those who need it, like Canadians have received. Instead, our response has been patchwork, uncoordinated, and insufficient — putting millions of lives unnecessarily at risk.
The coronavirus pandemic has revealed a simple fact: it’s low-wage workers like cleaners, cashiers, and care workers who make our society run — not bankers, landlords, or CEOs.
For years, Emmanuel Macron has worked to get rid of the 35-hour workweek and worker protections from unfair dismissal. Today, his government is using the coronavirus lockdown as a pretext to push ahead with this agenda — and allow bosses to unilaterally undermine labor conditions.
The airline industry will not survive the coronavirus. Now is the time to nationalize it — and use this moment to chart a course to a low-carbon future.
Australian workers need an economic bailout to save them from a coronavirus-induced depression. Instead, Scott Morrison’s right-wing government is using the state to attack unions and shovel money to corporations.
Our new political education series, Stay at Home, launches this Thursday at 6 PM EST on our YouTube channel, with special guest Mike Davis.
Even before the coronavirus, the United States’ sanctions against Iran were unconscionable. But now, with one person dying of coronavirus every ten minutes in Iran, the sanctions are killing untold numbers of people. They must end now.